Artist of the Week: Christopher Rush

I feel as if it is now about time we feature the artist who has created the art for the most widely known and most powerful card ever printed: Christopher Rush. He provided art for none other than... What? No, not Jace, the Mind Sculptor. Jason Chan did the art for that and we just featured him last week. No, Christopher Rush did the art for none other than the Black Lotus.

Modern Mondays: Improved Red/White Burn

After getting third place at an FNM with my original Red/White burn deck, I decided to make modifications to it in order to make it faster and make it even more "modern."

This, of course, means including cards such as Path to Exile.

Pyrophoros (U/R Tokens)

When Theros came out I ran in to a problem. I had built a "Power Summer" B/W Humans Deck and that left me deckless going into Theros. This issue lead me to many brews that I now have hidden somewhere in my computer. While delving through my files I found the little mine that was those deck ideas. U/R Token is one of the many decks that I found in that file.

Quite Shocking
The deck has one main goal, get Purphoros, God of the Forge out on the field and pump out an obscene amount of tokens to shock your opponent to death.

Creatures x4 Young Pyromancer x4 Purphoros, God of the Forge x4 Frostburn Weird x3 Master of Waves x2 Goblin Electromancer x2 Omen Speaker Land x4 Steam Vents x11 Mountain x10 Island

Other Spells x4 Molten Birth x4 Dissolve x2 Cyclonic Rift x2 Magma Jet x2 Curse of the Swine x2 Rapid Hybridization

Purphoros

Purphoro, God of the Forge is the main win condition brought by this deck. Many of the cards in the deck help get Purphoros, God of the Forge to trigger. This deck is not meant to use Purphoros as a creature, but as an enchantment that shock for each creature or as a way to pump your army for lethal. 

Token Engine

This deck has the capability to have a very large amount of token get onto the battlefield. It take advantage of mass token producers which include:

• Young Pyromancer - The Deck is host to a large amount of instants and sorceries (16) that help Young Pyromancer trigger. These tokens are then either used for: being fed into Curse of the Swine to make them bigger or get more damage from Purphoros, to get more Purphoros triggers, swarming your opponent with 1/1s, or using the elemental tokens produced by itself to be pumped by Master of Waves for a more aggressive plan.   
• Master of Waves - This deck does not have many cards that help your Blue devotion (Frostburn Weird, Goblin Electromancer, Master of Waves, and Omen Speaker) though what blue devotion it does have it uses to make Master of Waves: Make a large amount of tokens for an aggressive game plan, use the many creatures entering the battlefield from Master of Waves to trigger Purphoros, or use the elemental pump effect to boost the tokens made by Young Pyromancer.
• Curse of the Swine - Curse of the Swine is used as removal as it was meant to or in a more unorthodox manner by recycling already existing creature to either make them    larger (turn 1/1s and 2/1s into 2/2s) or get more Purphoros Triggers.
• Molten Birth - Molten Birth is very good at making elementals (we care about that) which can just further absurd amount of creatures.  
• Rapid Hybridization - It is great straight-up removal for one mana in these colors, also can be used to pump smaller creatures and get more Purphoros triggers.

Creatures (non-token engine)

• Frostburn Weird - Helps with devotion to both colors that the deck cares about, but also can just be a fantastic wall.
• Goblin Electromancer - It makes the Instants and sorceries just better making it easier to trigger Young Pyromancer which in turn makes it easier to trigger Purphoros.
• Omen Speaker- A nice wall that can help you get through the deck to get what you need.

Instants and Sorceries (non-token engine)

• Dissolve - Can deal with pesky spells and helps trigger Young Pyromancer
• Cyclonic Rift - Decent way to deal with pesky permanents and can be a great one sided board wipe, also can help trigger Young Pyromancer.
• Magma Jet - Can be decent early removal or damage, can also help you get through you deck, and helps trigger Young Pyromancer

Final Notes

This deck can go in many different directions that all split from the same path and end in the same location. While it may be hard to get set up at first, it can easily settle down and do what it is supposed to do. Try it out maybe change it a bit, add a color, or lose a color. Do what you will with my list. Just have fun with it. Good Luck.

Artist of the Week: Jason Chan

Jason Chan has done a decent amount of art for Wizards of the Coast. His earliest art for Magic can be traced back to Future Sight with art for Nimbus Maze and Pact of Negation.

  

I'm willing to bet, however, that those cards are not what he gets the most recognition for. I think that card is actually...

A Look at Dual Lands

Consider for a moment the variety of dual lands... You have THE dual lands, shocklands, scry lands, pain lands, check/tap lands, gates, karoo lands, filter lands and so on... You basically get the point. But how do they stack up against each other? Are any of them truly better than others? What makes one better than the others? Let's take a look...

So let's take a look at the comparisons of all of them:

Cast a Spell on MS Charity Tournament

"Cast a Spell on MS" is a charity tournament held in Toledo, Ohio for support of Multiple Sclerosis. It will be on March 29th at the Seagate convention center.

Events include:

• $15 Standard main event
• $10 Booster draft
• $10 Eight person Win-A-Loot(Standard, Legacy, and Modern)
• $5 Four person commander pods

There will also be auctions and raffles going on for items such as this:

Yes this is a foil sheet of Modern Masters
Bring some money since this will be auctioned off and all the proceeds will go to research for MS

For more information go to http://www.castaspellonms.org/

Artist of the Week: Eric Deschamps

Over the past couple of weeks, we have featured Daarken and Noah Bradley. This time, we're looking at work from Eric Deschamps, an artist who seems to have done art for an absurd number of mythic rares including planeswalkers. He also has done a decent amount of art for Theros and Born of the Gods. Let's take a look:

    

Red Battle Games is officially a sponsor for Monday Morning MTG

So some of you may have noticed the new ad/link on the bottom of the page. Our new sponsor is a store co-owned by a friend of mine, so I'm pleased to announce that Red Battle Games in Danville, Virginia is now our sponsor.

Artist of the Week: Daarken

Last week, in case you missed it, we featured Noah Bradley, and specifically it was for me to keep a promise I made that I'd remind everyone about his MTGO Moat art. Of course, I couldn't decide from all the different artists over the history of Magic, so once again, I looked to Twitter, and I saw this tweet:

Several years ago someone stole my last remaining Sarkhan Vol proof out of my binder. It was my only… http://t.co/EOq3kHg22D
— Daarken (@DaarkenArt) March 4, 2014

Commander Monday: Nekusar, "the Taxman"

He will help you, just go pay your taxes.

Legendary Creatures (3) x1 Nekusar, the Mindrazer (Commander) x1 Niv-Mizzet, the Firemind x1 Thraximundar Creatures (13) x1 Balefule Force x1 Balefule Strix x1 Echo Mage x1 Fate Unraveler x1 Fog Bank x1 Jace's Archivist x1 Laboratory Maniac x1 Nightscape Familiar x1 Perplexing Chimera x1 Prince of Thralls x1 Psychosis Crawler x1 Shriekmaw x1 Viseling

Instants (11) x1 Crosis's Charm x1 Cyclonic Rift x1 Dark Ritual x1 Fated Return x1 Grixis Charm x1 Illusionist;s Gambit x1 Lim-Dul's Vault x1 Mystical Tutor x1 Starstorm x1 Sudden Spoiling x1 Vision Skeins x1 Wild Ricochet Sorceries (16) x1 Cruel Ultimatum x1 Decree of Pain x1 Deep Analysis x1 Fissure Vent x1 Incendiary Command x1 Infest x1 Scrambleverse x1 Skyscribing x1 Slaughter Games x1 Slave of Bolas x1 Strategic Planning x1 Tempt with Reflection x1 Thieves' Auction x1 Toxic Deluge x1 Wheel of Fortune x1 Whims of the Fates Enchantments (8) x1 Arcane Melee x1 Curse of Echoes x1 Curse of Shallow Graves x1 Liliana's Caress x1 Price of Knowledge x1 Propaganda x1 Spitefule Visions x1 Underworld Dreams

Artifacts (12) x1 Black Vise x1 Crawlspace x1 Gilded Lotus x1 Howling Mine x1 Izzet Signet x1 Mirari x1 Nevinyrral's Disk x1 Prototype Portal x1 Sensei's Divining Top x1 Sol Ring x1 Swiftfoot Boots x1 Temple Bell Planeswalkers (1) x1 Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker Lands (36)  x1 Bojuka Bog x1 Command Tower x1 Crumbling Necropolis x1 Dimir Aquedect x1 Dimir Guildgate x1 Evolving Wilds x1 Gemstone Caverns x1 Izzet Boilerworks x1 Izzet Guildgate x1 Molten Slagheap x1 Opal Palace x1 Rakdos Carnarium x1 Rakdos Guildgate x1 Reliquary Tower x1 Rupture Spire x1 Temple of the False God x1 Vivid Creek x1 Vivid Marsh x6 Island x8 Swamp x4 Mountain

Today I present to you my baby, Nekusar, the Mindrazer (aka "the Taxman"). It is a very simple deck, all you have to do is revel as your opponents draw some cards and you cause some chaos.

Modern Mondays: Red/White Burn

When you think Red/White in Modern, you probably first think of Lightning Helix. If you think of the same thing in Standard, you'd probably think Boros Charm. When doing a deck that revolves around direct burn and you implement white in addition to red, Lightning Helix and Boros Charm are definitely the two you want.

     

Playing in the "MUD"

When you play standard at a more competitive level, there will always be decks that are at the top. Luckily, during this season, we are blessed with a diverse ecosystem of, top tier challengers from "tap Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx 4 times and get 50 mana that I will then pump into Polukranos, World Eater," to "play a bunch of black stuff while killing all of your creatures until I get a full charging Desecration Demon or cast Gray Merchant of Asphodel for lethal."

Noah Bradley, Everyone

So a few days ago, I noticed a tweet by Noah Bradley, one of the newer MTG artists. He's done several art pieces, many of which I like. He has brought us land art:

    

and he has brought us new art for an old favorite and art for a Standard red staple...